Jordan Belfort, or more popularly known as the Wolf of Wall Street is a motivational speaker and an American author. He was convicted of fraud crime related to stock market manipulations for which he spent almost 2 years in prison. He was called the “king of funny business” when the American stock market crashed in 1987.
After completing his undergraduate studies for New York in 1984, Jordon headed straight to Baltimore College of Dental Surgery. His mother always wanted him to be a doctor, but landed a seat at the Dental College. The change happened on the very first day at the college, where the Dean of the college announced “The golden age of dentistry is over. If you’re here simply because you’re looking to make lot money, you’re in the wrong place.” This made Jordan rethink his objective and approach.
After leaving dental school, Belfort became a meat and seafood salesman, working for a distributor before branching out on his own. A few years later he founded the brokerage firm Stratton Oakmont which functioned as a boiler room marketing penny stocks. This is where he defrauded investors with fraudulent stock sales. He trained young brokers in applying high-pressure tactics to trick unwitting investors into paying inflated prices for worthless stocks. The brokerage firm employed over 1000 stock brokers and was involved in stock issues totaling more than $1 billion.
Belfort was known for his hard-partying lifestyle, which included a serious drug addiction. At the height of his drug problem, he was taking 22 different medications: 20 quaaludes a day, balanced out by cocaine, the morphine, xanax, valium, etc.
In 1998 Jordan Belfort was indicted for securities fraud and money laundering. He eventually ended up serving 22 months in prison and was ordered to pay victims of his fraud $110m in restitution. He was barred from the industry, and Stratton was shuttered.
While in prison, Belfort wrote two memoirs, The Wolf of Wall Street and Catching the Wolf of Wall Street, which have been published in approximately 40 countries and translated into 18 languages. The famous Hollywood director, Martin Scorsese, turned Belfort’s life story into a motion picture, staring Leonardo DiCaprio, Jonah Hill, and Matthew McConaughey.
The motion picture is named as the Wolf of Wall Street and is due to release on 25th December 2013.
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